Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/656512
MARCH 23-29, 2016 UCW 13 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM In nearly 50 years, Fayetteville voters have never approved a parks and recreation bond referendum — until now. Similar bond proposals have failed on at least four other occasions, as far back as 1969 and most re- cently in 2012. Three and a half years ago, a $45 million bond proposal never got off the ground. City Council dead- locked 5-5 in efforts to put a vote to the people. Twice in the 1980s and in 1969, voters rejected parks and recreation referenda by 4-1 margins. This year, 60 percent of the electorate turned out in fa- vor of a $35 mil- lion referendum. The reason for success this time, many observers believe, is two-fold,. Primarily, opposition was impotent; and there were lessons learned from the most recent failure. As for the opposition, one school of thought is that the naysayers, notably former City Council members Juanita Gonzalez and Val Applewhite, actually gave supporters a boost in the final two weeks of the campaign. Gonzalez has had a long-time political reputation for naysaying, which backfired as fence sitters hopped off on the side of supporting the bond referendum. Most importantly though, City Council reflected on the reasons why a proposed $45 million referendum failed to win majority council support three-and-a-half years ago. The centerpiece of the 2012 proposal was a multipurpose indoor pool, field house and senior center that carried a $45 million price tag. Ted Mohn, who had returned to City Council after a hia- tus, along with several freshmen members, said that the cost and proposed location of the multipurpose fa- cility were major obstacles then and should not be considered now. Last spring, Mohn broached the idea of an- other bond issue. The council eliminated the costly joint-use building and re- duced the refer- endum to no more than $35 million. That number, as it turns out, made the difference with voters. If passed, it would increase the property tax rate by only $.0135, or roughly less than $20 a year for the average home owner. Council did its due diligence over several months, decided on specific proj- ects and locations for individual facilities and put together a well-thought out plan. Civic groups for and against the issue advertised their points of view. The city, by law, could not take a position. But it did launch a campaign urging people to vote. Local civic organizations, including the Chamber of Commerce, endorsed the issue the last few weeks before the March 15 primary date. The ballot also included a statewide capital projects bond issue. Both passed. ANALYSIS How and Why the Parks Bond Issue Passed The City of Fayetteville and the North Carolina State Department of Transpor- tation have agreed to construct nearly two miles of sidewalks along Owen Drive. Sidewalks will be built from Eastern Boulevard (US301) to the All American Expressway at Old Owen Drive. The $549,000.00 project won't get underway until the summer of 2017, according to the N.C. Department of Transportation, but it has been funded. Eighty percent of the funds are provided by the federal government. The city will pay the other 20 percent or $112,000.00. "This will be a great project to im- prove pedestrian connectivity along one of the highest travelled corridors in the city," said Fayetteville Traffic Engineer Lee Jernigan. Construction is estimated to take from six to eight months. The 1.8 miles of sidewalks will be constructed along the east side of Owen Drive. That's the side the ABC Store and Briarwood Apartments are located on. Fayetteville Area System of Transit patrons will also benefit. Eight bus stop pads will be built along the route. Some of them will be mini-projects in and of themselves. Narrow berms along some por- tions of the shoulder of the highway in the vicin- ity of Briarwood have served as bus stops. They are extremely dan- gerous because the berms are adjacent to steep drainage ditches. Those areas will require a major buildup for the walkway. Some of the bus stops may have to be relocated in order to better accommodate patrons, Jernigan said. "This is part of the North Carolina Department of Transportation's safety improvement project," Jernigan noted. Sidewalk Project Slated for Owen Drive by JEFF THOMPSON